CTS Affinity One 5wt Build

[Michael]

Yeah I tend to agree with Shaun, I'd leave it as is. Unless you have an old rod, where you can try and experiment with the sanding off of the finish and re-apply, to see how it comes out. Any fly shop should have broken section, i'm sure they will give it to you.

Otherwise, contact Tom Kirkman, he may be able to help.

Your inscription area is quite big too...I try and keep it short. Less finish, and less hassle about applying and levelling the finish.
Your rod doesn't look too shabby though, I'd leave it as is. An excuse to get another blank and build another rod!
Maybe one in Honey colour?? Awesome blanks those.

[ShaunF]

Kevin,

I've just discovered something that may help you at least make the finish look better. Humour me for a second here.

When I built my first XP, I also had a bit of a problem with the waviness of the finish over the signature area. I also got a bit of a wavy finish over the graphic on my rod, mostly due to the fact that I did not apply down the rod, but went around in bands, so it had a rippled effect over the graphic area.

It didn't look that bad, but I noticed it, and like you, considered ways to get rid of it, but have never done anything about it.

Here's where things got interesting. I just got a factory built rod back from Sage (long story), and whilst giving it a looking over, noticed there was a splodge of epoxy on the blank, where someone obviously touched it with wet epoxy on their finger.

I figured maybe I could try to rub it off, so I took a very soft Meguars Microfibre cloth, normally used for detailing cars (Its quite expensive for a cloth, around R100 here, but is sur[erb fpr detailing cars as it is guaranteed not to scratch. Its white, with a short pile and a black overlocked border), and folded it in half around the rod and rubbed it rapidly over this epoxy mark. It generates quite a lot of frictional heat, enough to burn your fingers, but after about a minute or 2, the epoxy mark was gone, with no damage to the rod finish.

I was quite surprised, but thought it probably had something to do with the heat buildup that allowed the epoxy to soften enough for the cloth to remove it.

This got me thinking, why not try it on the XP where the waviness is. I just spent the last 15 minutes polishing the graphic area with cloth, moving up and down the rod very rapidly and twisting the rod inside the cloth as I went. You know what ? Here's the wierd thing, the finish looks 1000% better. Somehow it seems to be a lot flatter, with noticably less ripple and waviness, a great improvement. It didn't go sticky again or anything like that either, and looks like a mirror now, very very shiny.

I can't promise anything, but I can definitely see a vast improvement on my own rod, but did also use a different product to finish it. Perhaps you should try this before doing anything drastic like sanding it and refinishing it ?

[KevinE]

Wow, thanks for the tip Shaun. So you reckon that you smoothed out the wavy area? Sounds worth a try and I can always sand if it doesn't work. I have plenty of suitable microfibre cloth aound as my dad is in the automobile preparation and finishing game.

I wasn't going to do anything just yet, first wanted to show it to my rodbuilder mate when we go fishing next weekend.

[ShaunF]

Kev, as strange as it sounds, yes it actually did. As I said though, I used Flexcoat lite and had 2 thin coats over the graphic, but it is noticeably flatter than it was.

Could work, might not, but is worth a try at least.

[Michael]

Sharp tip there Shaun...sounds like a winner to me. I reckon I'm going to aquire some of that cloth too, and see how it works. Sounds good though.

[KevinE]

Shaun, I tried your method but it didn't seem to work for me. Perhaps I had the wrong sort of microfibre cloth. Anyway, my mentor in Auckland is convinced that old product is to blame and he has organised some fresh stuff for me from Mudhole. I'll sand down the area and re-finish when the Clear Coat arrives.

In the meantime the rod is still fishable, unfortunately we have had a very wet start to the season and all the streams are high and dirty. But I managed a lawn casting session with the rod and my new Rio Grand line on the weekend. What a ripper! The rod feels light in the hand and is incredibly responsive. It loads easily for short casts at typical stream fishing distances. Yet it also has plenty of reserve power for distance casting. I think I am in love. Hopefully I'll be able to give a full on-stream appraisal soon.....